Positive Vs Negative Case Pressure and Airflow

All the components inside a computer, be it RAM, Motherboard, CPU or GPU dissipate waste heat to the surrounding. For this method to work, it is necessary to have colder air surrounding the areas where heat is dissipated.

The air inside the case gets hotter with time, and this is where airflow comes into play. Here, Airflow defines as replacing the air inside of the case with air from outside. This is necessary to keep the process of dissipating heat efficient.

To achieve this case fans are used. In a standard computer, they are divided into two types, intake and exhaust. As the name suggests, intake fans, intake air and exhaust fans are used to push it out.

Implementing such kind of a system improperly can cause disasters. Each case fan added to your case increases the total noise it produces, Thought there are quiet case fans such as Noctua NF-A14, but even they contribute to the overall sound. That’s not it, each case fan added also contributes to an in-case pressure change.

Having too many exhaust fans can create a negative pressure which will force dust particles from surrounding to get inside the case. Having too many intake fans can do the complete opposite and produce positive pressure, this will not cause any issues related to dust(Considering you are using dust filters with intake fans) but it’s not the most efficient way to achieve lower temperatures.

The optimal solution for this problem is a balance between both intake and exhaust fans. This way you will only need to get dust filters for the intake fans.

Unfortunately, there is no easy way to find out if your case is configured correctly. Unless, you have a smoke machine to test this.

Then how to figure out if you need to change your case fans setup?

Just monitor the dust accumulation over time, if you find any abnormal/unexpected results, It’s time for you to add an intake fan. If you are unsure of which fan full fills this purpose, check out our review of Corsair AF120, this fan comes in both 120mm and 140mm versions and has incredible performance.

With the introduction of more powerful/advanced hardware and the user’s need for it to be compact has made temperature control much harder but keeping in mind the tips given above, You might never need to face such issues.

Process Of Dissipation Heat

It is part of thermodynamics, In this process an object which is comparatively higher in temperature than it’s surrounding transfers heat to maintain it’s temperature.